As violence flares once again in Iraq, Democrats are planning to unleash a barrage of ads arguing that President Bush is to blame for the instability and the increasing number of American casualties in the war on terror.

While the Democratic nominee, Senator Kerry of Massachusetts, has been sharply critical of the president’s Iraq policy, he has not chosen to attack it head-on in TV commercials. The ostensibly independent groups that have raised more than $150 million to defeat Mr. Bush have tended either to shy away from the Iraq issue or to paint the conflict as a distraction from domestic priorities.

Now, that strategy appears to be changing.

With the death toll in Iraq mounting, several political groups are planning to unveil ads that make a frontal assault on Mr. Bush’s wartime leadership, Democratic political strategists said.

“I think it’s impossible to avoid,” said a longtime Democratic operative and former aide to Mr. Kerry, Christopher Lehane. He said the issue had to be joined because Mr. Bush has made security a key focus of his campaign. “It’s the centerpiece of his presidency and his candidacy,” Mr. Lehane said.

Officials at the Web-based grassroots organization, Moveon.org, confirmed yesterday that the group’s political action committee will release a new ad on the Iraq issue this morning, though they declined to provide details.

One Democratic consultant said he believes Iraq will become a more prominent theme in the next crop of ads because many elusive swing voters are women.

“Women don’t like to see body bags. They don’t like to see flag-draped coffins,” said the adviser, who asked not to be named. “My suspicion is you’re going to see more of that.”

The move to use Iraq as a political cudgel against Mr. Bush comes as some Democrats expressed frustration at the short shrift the Iraq issue has gotten in the torrent of political advertising that has spewed forth in the past year.

“There’s no conversation. There’s no outrage about it,” said a veteran Democratic campaign manager, Donna Brazile. “Over a billion dollars spent on ads. I haven’t seen a lot about Iraq.”

During the Republican convention, the Democratic National Committee ran a 15-second TV ad that challenged Mr. Bush’s policy on Iraq. But such ads are the exception, rather than the rule.

Ms. Brazile said she thought some of Mr. Bush’s recent gains in the polls were due to the absence of a clear message on Iraq from the Kerry campaign and the so-called 527 groups, which are named for the legal provision under which they were organized.

“That’s why you see people moving back towards the president on Iraq, because there’s no contrast out there,” she said.

One Democratic activist became so riled up by the absence of the Iraq issue from the ad wars that he started his own 527 organization.

“I woke up in mid-August and said, ‘Why isn’t anyone talking about this?’ I didn’t see anyone out there on the horizon,” said a former director of Internet outreach for General Clark’s campaign, Eric Carbone.

Mr. Carbone’s new group, the Fight Back Campaign, has produced two TV ads that it bills as “hard-hitting.”

In one ad, released yesterday, ominous music plays in the background as the age, rank, and hometowns of American soldiers killed in Iraq scroll across a black screen.

“Terrible mistakes were made….Over a thousand soldiers lost. And they still have no plan,” the ad declares.

Mr. Carbone said the ad, which was created by Joe Slade White of East Aurora, will begin airing next week in Charleston, West Virginia and Madison, Wisconsin. So far, the brand-new group has raised only $20,000, which is a pittance compared to the larger 527s.

A spokesman for the Bush campaign predicted that the new ads would fall flat because Mr. Kerry has not articulated a clear alternative to Mr. Bush’s policies on Iraq.

“Whether you agree or disagree with the president, you know where the president stands,” said the spokesman, Kevin Madden. “You can’t say the same for John Kerry.”

A New York-based campaign adviser, Norman Adler, agreed.

“Since the candidate hasn’t taken any one position for any length of time, it’s hard to reflect his views,” Mr. Adler said. “Part of the problem is that to criticize the president very strongly in

Iraq is to raise the question, compared to what?”

Mr. Kerry’s campaign did not respond to a request for a comment for this story. However, Mr. Carbone said he believes Mr. Kerry must bring the issue to the fore.

“If they think they can win without talking about national security and what’s going on in Iraq, I personally don’t think that’s a smart move,” he said.

In an interview yesterday with radio host Don Imus, Mr. Kerry said his plan for resolving the Iraq crisis is becoming more complex because the situation is deteriorating.

“The plan gets more complicated every single day,” the candidate said.

“Try to simplify it for me,” Mr. Imus interjected.

“You’ve got to get the international community at the table. I would immediately call a summit meeting of the European community. They haven’t lived up to their obligations,” Mr. Kerry said, before expressing some irritation with Mr. Imus’s line of questioning.

“What you ought to be doing and what everybody in America ought to be doing is not asking me. They ought to be asking the president: What is your plan? What’s your plan to stop these kids from being killed,” Mr. Kerry said.

Mr. Kerry brushed aside the suggestion that two of his new campaign advisers, Paul Begala and James Carville, are actually hoping for a Democratic loss this year so that Senator Clinton can run for the presidency in 2008.

“I don’t agree with that. That’s everybody’s game. That’s speculation. I just don’t believe that,” Mr. Kerry said.

Mr. Kerry added that he has no plans to read a best-selling book that assails his military record, “Unfit for Command.”

“It’s an absolute pack of lies,” the senator said.

Mr. Kerry also said his 1971 Senate testimony alleging widespread atrocities in the Vietnam War was not a suggestion that large numbers of soldiers had deliberately committed war crimes.

“What I was referring to in that testimony was the general categorization of free fire zones in Vietnam and the general categorization of some of the weapons that were being used,” he said. “I’ve never meant to impugn-I’ve never meant to categorize all soldiers somehow in that category.”

As examples of wartime excess, Mr. Kerry cited a CIA-backed program to kill South Vietnamese leaders, called the Phoenix Project.

Meanwhile, election-related legal maneuvering continued in Washington, D.C., and in the key battleground state of Florida.

In Florida yesterday, a state judge ordered county election officials not to include the name of independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader when printing absentee ballots. The judge’s ruling overturned a Florida election official’s instruction to begin printing ballots with Mr. Nader’s name.

The Florida Supreme Court is scheduled to hear arguments tomorrow on whether Mr. Nader deserves a ballot line.